Friday, July 06, 2007

The past few Fridays have been dedicated to art. Today, I shift a little and write about my upcoming Great Bike Ride - RAGBRAI. Two weeks from Sunday I begin the 477 mile journey across my home state. Here's the route - again.

With many towns in between. I'm looking forward to Iowa pork tenderloins, sweet corn, cinnamon rolls and beer! Not to mention the hundreds of non-profits who are raising funds across the state. My sister once baked 20 or 30 dozen cookies to benefit her classrooms. True community!

I'm experiencing separation anxiety today. My bike is in transit via FedEx after being carefully packed by the best bike guys - WheelSport East. Today, my 17 year old Schwinn transported me to work. I need a bike with a rack to lug my panniers so a friend is loaning me his commuter bike.

I am jazzed to say the least (jazz is an art form, ain't it? :). I'm riding about 40 miles a day with weekends dedicated to longer rides. Last weekend I logged just over 100 miles. Much of it was pleasant as I had company.

Tammy, from my support team Pork Belly Ventures (isn't that a cute little pig on a bicycle) called this morning to say a room has opened up at the unofficial PBV hotel for my one night at the end of the ride. Read this about charter expectations and tell me this ride won't be a scream:

What Does PBV Expect of You? LIVE LIKE A PIG. That means handle. Deal. Roll with it. Lower your standards and you can't be disappointed. Pigs can turn a bad day into a good story. They give respect, appreciation, and good-natured guff to PBV crew members, the hardest working people on this entire ride. Pigs help each other out. They love to yuk it up, but out of courtesy they are quiet before 5:00 a.m. and after 10:00 p.m. Pigs pick up every speck of trash before leaving a host town. They never climb onto a Pork truck-just hand the bags up to our truck loaders each morning. Pigs manage to find comfort in uncomfortable places. We hope you have it in you to live like pigs.

That, my friends, is a worthy way to approach the adventure.

Here are a few cycling links -

Windy City Biker - Steve from Winnetka logs his commute in ChicagoBike Snob - if you ride this will crack you up! If you don't - look at the fun you're missing. Some good ol' NYC satire and humor.MasiGuy - MasiGuy is moving me closer and closer to more writing on cycling.

15 comments:

we'll see you on the road bob! i'm riding with 3 others as team "Bloganostra". we're starting in cedar falls but will at least attempt to say hi in independence if not along the way. i can probably say for sure i'll be wearing a blues brother's jersey day one. i ride a red trek madone. hope all is well. doug from moments of clarity blog.

aaahhh, yes Drew - the beautiful balmy weather of Iowa in July - lol! what kind of foolhardy knucklehead would want to ride across Iowa on a bike in July?!?!

hey Doug - I'm riding a Blue specialized expedition and traveling with Pork Belly Ventures....they carry the beer :) - I'll look for you and hope to touch base - so long as I don't need to know the Bloganostra secret handshake :)

A quick hello to let you know that Fuelmyblog has had some surgery done and lots of changes have happened.Your current voting widget is not valid, to fix this all you need to do is login to your account with Fuel and follow the link for widgets. All the widgets displayed on that page have the code matching your blog and are ready to copy and paste.

Good luck at RAGBRAI. Last year was my first one, and it was an awesome experience (not going this year). I'm not really a biker, but got 950 miles in before the ride, and generally did not have any issues (exception: hills, heat, and headwinds on 2nd day almost did me in - but I did not SAG!). I also went with PBV and they are a great bunch. You cannot go wrong with them. Enjoy the Elders on the first night.

You know I will Ryan :) - was going to try and blog it a couple days. I'm going unplugged so I'll need to assess the online capabilities in the pass through town libraries. Thanks for the good wishes -

Thank you Jackie - "all the best" is a wish I can live with :) - So far the training and surrounding fun has been beyond my imagination. The people involved in the ride - especially my support team - all have a love for the event...and it shows.

Who? Me?

About Me

It's a blog about community and conversation - learning and growing. Musings originate from the Great Northwest, USA. Explore, imagine, create! Why NOT bite off more than you can chew? Reflections focus on a life lived with a sense of discovery, surprise and amazement. Stir in a few insights on media and the newspaper business. Mix with meditations on cycling (and recycling), bluegrass, baseball and growing old gracefully. I am an unrepentant DeadHead and friend to all. This blog expresses my opinions only - really.